*Drool*

I want one

Catching up with the hobbyists

There have been people taking 3D photos and movies for years, simply using a pair of cameras with a single trigger. They are a bit more flexible too, since you can move the cameras apart to get shots that appear further away. About time that someone brought out a cheaper single camera version, it's hardly rocket science.

Everyone remembers those big chunky red viewers with the disks that display 3D pictures, seems odd that it has taken so long.

Magic!

Great possibilities...

But also STOP. I would happily buy one at 1/3 that price, but £570 is a huge sum for what may end up being a novelty item.

10 megapixels seems pointless as you need a screen to view the pictures with and the screen Fuji are releasing to do this has a resolution of just 600X400 according to this article:

http://www.photographybay.com/2009/07/22/fuji-finepix-real-3d-w1/

Sure 10MP means you can use it for 2D pics too, but it is extremely unlikely that anyone would buy this as their main or only camera, so I wonder why they didnt go for cheaper low-resolution hardware matched to the spec of the viewing screen, which would have enabled a more mass-market price point.

I dont see that there is that much R&D expenditure to pay for with this - software & self-adhisive lenticular lenses for interlacing stereo image pairs into a single picture that can be printed on a normal inkjet are off-the-shelf items.

I hope they'll make a desktop 3D print kit to go with it (some kind of 6X9 photo printer with a lenticular lens laminator).

Price fail: £570?!? They're mad!

I thought this would be the product that finally cracked the 3D nut, as they also have both 3D digital picture frames and 3D prints sorted, but £570 is nothing short of insane.

Discussing this last night, my friends and I decided that £199 would be ideal, £299 might work, but I don't think they'll sell more than a handful at £570. I could strap two cameras together for much less, OK I wouldn't get the 3D screen, but if that saves me £200 I can live with that!

>"When shooting in bog-standard 2D mode, the camera’s dual lenses allow two slightly different shots to be taken with a single shutter button depression. For example, you could take a close-up view of your friend at a party and simultaneously snap a second image with a wider span that takes in the surroundings."

Can you really use different zoom levels on each half of the camera? That sounds very unlikely to me.

Viewing?

use limitation?

Brilliant sales tactics...

..."Right I've got me 3D camera now. Paid a premium. Taken some snaps. Family is round, lets all gather round and view em all on our lounge TV."

"Ah right, can't...actually...do it."

"So HOW MUCH did u say for that 3D TV set!? Shyeah right. And what do you mean I have to be sat right square in front of the TV to see the effect? What about everybody else in the family? Oh. And its not even that convincing an effect? Right."

Since the lenses

are all of 75mm apart you're not going to be getting any sort of noticeable stereo effect unless the subject is quite close - within reaching distance, in fact - which means it's only really useful for one thing (see icon).

@Brilliant sales tactics...

Bet it'll be heavily compressed

I hold out very little hope that this will allow the recording of video at a low enough compression ratio to allow decent post-processing. Why bother offering the latest whizz-bang technology then crippling it to the level of an upmarket webcam?

Add me to the list

of those confused as to how this works on printed paper.

Still, two lenses is a nice idea for 2D work. Right now, as far as I know, HDR is hard to manage for things in motion, since the images are taken sequentially. Since this snaps two shots simultaneously, seems like it would overcome that, though you typically need >2 images for good HDR.

Old gimmick

There were film cameras, with special printing tech

Yoo could get various attachments for film cameras, and viewers for slides. For landscapes, you could get a stereo effect just by taking two shots, and shifting your weight from one foot to the other between shots.

75mm is the same sort of spacing as your eyes.

To be honest, there are a lot of 10 megapixel cameras out there, and most of them skimp on the lenses. Optically, with the sensor size, getting the resolution is hard. Getting 10MP equivalence out of 35mm film needed top class equipment.

And for the sort of prints most people use, the resolution of the sensor is wasted anyway.

If you want photographic pose power, forget this. Get a Leica instead.

@Vladimir

I've just been reading the discussion about this over at dpreview, and according to one poster there it's a single "multi picture format" file. Usual warnings about information posted on internet forums apply....

NIMSLO

Hmmm ...

Price is very relative. I remember buying the first gen Sony minidisk player/recorder available in this country and it was £500 in about 1991/92. I've Still got it and it still works great, but I seldom use it.

That was serious cash back then, but £500 today, although still too much to be comfortable about loosing, is worth considerably less.

I still have my trusty old Tag Heuer after 20 years (before they got naff) which I wear all the time in showers, swimming and in bed and that was about the same price. Now that *was* a worthwhile purchase. It seems a bargain now.